Writtle

The village and civil parish of Writtle lies west of Chelmsford, Essex, England. It has a traditional village green complete with duck pond and a Norman church, and was once described as "one of the loveliest villages in England, with a ravishing variety of ancient cottages". The village is now home to Writtle University College, one of the UK's oldest and largest land-based colleges and a partner institution of the University of Essex, the grounds of which once housed a Royal hunting lodge, later the possession of the De Brus and De Bohun families. The suggestion that Writtle is the birthplace of Robert the Bruce, as well as his father Robert de Brus, 6th Lord of Annandale, is contested, though its possession and use by both is incontrovertible. From 1996 until 2017 Writtle hosted the annual southern V Festival within the grounds of Sir John Comyn's Hylands Park. At the 2001 census, it had a population of 5,632, decreasing to 5,383 at the 2011 Census. The Romans were present in Writtle shortly after the Roman conquest by Claudius, but the presence of a metalled road, numerous archaeological finds and the ease with which the river can be forded in Writtle are still not significant enough evidence to suggest that Writtle, rather than Chelmsford, was the site of the Roman town of Caesaromagus, as suggested by the Essex historian Philip Morant (et al). The place-name 'Writtle' is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Writelam. It appears in a charter circa 1136 as Writela. This was originally the name of the River Wid, as attested in an Anglo-Saxon charter of 692 where the river appears as Writolaburna. This name is thought to mean 'babbling burn or brook'. Named in the Little Domesday Book as a Royal demesne (manor) of 194 households, the village boasts the site of one of King John's hunting lodges (circa 1210), sited within the grounds of the present HE institution Writtle College. The estate and village were later a possession of Isabel de Brus (Bruce), via a 16 October 1241 grant of Henry III and a known residence of her grandson Robert, father to the future king.